


Harbinger

by leradny



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Canon disabled characters, Family, Gen, Mentors, Tough Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-03 10:33:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17282429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leradny/pseuds/leradny
Summary: Paula adjusts to the chair mostly on her own. She passes her hard-earned knowledge down to Barbara Gordon. [COMPLETE]





	1. the weight of prophecy

**Author's Note:**

> this began with me wanting paula to be barbara's mentor on adjusting to a wheelchair.
> 
> it ballooned out into bruce helping paula as both batman and a charming taxi driver, a cameo from Ace The Bat Hound (TM) bc i love pit bulls, jade having a not-so-happy reunion with her mother (srsly, don't abandon your kid sister to suffer your abusive father alone), and The Importance of Tea Time.

Paula has three reasons for kicking Lawrence out of her house.

The first was not bothering to bring Jade back home in six years. If he'd tried and couldn't find her, well, he would have said something about it, and that would have been forgivable. Jade was as slippery as an oiled rope even at thirteen and it was usually Paula who found her anyway.

Forgetting the day Paula got out of jail was another. She was the one who reminded him about birthdays and anniversaries, the one who kept to a schedule when they were on a mark. It hurt, but Paula wouldn't have taken it personally. He did write and visit sometimes.

Ignoring her wish to get out of the life was the last straw.

Of course, these are all symptoms of one problem: That Lawrence is still the man she married while Paula has changed.

When she tells her remaining daughter that they're not going to be career criminals anymore, Artemis looks relieved but says nothing beyond a casual, "All right, I guess."

There's a moment just after Paula climbs into her cold bed alone and realizes she can't reach the light--she almost changes her mind. Their family is so small now, a voice whispers--only her and Artemis. Jade is gone, Lawrence has left. The money she saved up in prison along with her disability pension is enough for a few months of bills, but what will that time get her? The only people she knows are still in the life, and she can't talk to them anymore. She could do a job, even now, even without Lawrence. Even without her legs. Just enough to get by for a few more months.

This is how drug addicts must feel, Paula thinks. She pulls the covers over her head and meditates, partly to calm herself, partly to wonder if she wants to get back in her chair and wheel all the way over to the light, or if she wants to call Artemis. Neither one is enjoyable.

The light turns off as she struggles. Paula sighs. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

This is not her daughter. This is a deep voice which she has only heard once.

It was the same voice Paula heard after she woke up on the concrete. There was a moment of white-hot, searing pain and then darkness. When she came to, the worst part was that everything below her waist faded away to a complete sense of nothing. A shadow fell over her arm. She tried to twist around, caught a flash of black boots before the voice said, "Don't." For good measure he knelt and pinned her shoulders to the ground.

Because this was Batman, she swore at him in Vietnamese. "Cho de! I'm already paralyzed!" With a lot more swearing as sirens flashed and a car pulled up.

"That is the ambulance," Batman told her.

"Ambulance, police, whatever."

"I am sorry," Batman said, and it was only then that she realized he was speaking Vietnamese as well. "This was not something I wanted to happen."

\- - -

Paula sits up. In English, she says sharply: "You are too polite for someone in Gotham."

"If you need help--"

"You are not responsible for this," Paula tells him. "I did not blame you even at the start." Batman, as she and Lawrence so frequently mocked him, was a huge softie who didn't kill anyone. If he'd had a chance, she bets he would have stopped her fall somehow. (In her less proud moments, she wishes he had.)

"Still," he says.

She frowns. "What kind of help?"

"I have numbers."

She frowns because she is torn between accepting his help and continuing to nurse her pride, like a dog licking a wound. She settles for something in-between: "I already have numbers." Because she does, she remembers--she'd forgotten in her despair, but she had been given a list of resources by one of the kinder clerks. Benefits of good behavior. She refuses to think that they were being sympathetic--that they felt sorry for how she'd lost her legs.

"These are different." He holds out a slip of paper with a few numbers and names listed in neat writing--neither calligraphy nor chicken-scratch, completely devoid of personality.

Paula takes the slip and, with care, turns back to put it on her dresser. "Well, thank you." She doesn't say she'll call them. She half expects Batman to be gone, but when she looks up he is still there, standing in her bedroom.

"I tried to find your other daughter."

Paula waves a hand in dismissal. "You'll probably arrest her too."

"I only apprehend locals," Batman says. "Jade is in South Korea. Or she was about two months ago before her trail went cold."

"If she wants to come see me, she will." Paula lies down again. She tries not to take it personally.

\- - -

In the morning she makes tea.

Or tries to.

The problem is, she cannot reach anything anymore.

She does not cry as as she stares at the cabinets which are now too high for her. She did enough crying her first night in prison. But she can't bring herself to ask Artemis for help. She is the mother. She must be strong.

Paula grips the edge of the counter and pulls until she's sitting on it. At least her arms are still strong, she thinks. She seizes the the kettle and it clatters onto the stove with a satisfying clunk. And sitting on the counter, things move faster. She grabs the tea boxes and moves them within her new reach. Lotus tea for today. She keeps rearrangements to this for now, but notes that she will have to do more later.

And then she does what she hasn't done for years: She forgets she's paralyzed. She grips the edge of the counter and tries to hop down onto the ground--onto her feet, which she hasn't felt for over half a decade--and clatters onto the floor with a curse.

This draws her daughter immediately comes to her side. "Mom! Are you okay?"

"Don't bother, I already broke my spine," Paula grumbles, pushing Artemis' arm away. But Artemis hovers and Paula relents a little. She remembers--Jade was the one who would give her space. Artemis needs to do something, to feel useful. "Hold my chair steady and I'll pull myself up."

Artemis takes hold of the chair handles like a lifeline. From the floor Paula sees her hands are steady--archery will do that--but her eyes, her eyes shake with desperation. Jade left, Paula remembers. Right after Paula went to prison, Jade left and only Lawrence was left to care for her. Lawrence who still lives their old life with gusto and would have trained her as such. Hard. Maybe hard in the wrong ways.

Paula takes the edge of her chair in one hand and pulls it hard, which Artemis wasn't expecting. She wobbles a little.

"Sorry!" she says at once. And she bites back something else. Her throat works.

Paula will have to wean Artemis off Lawrence's training and onto her own. She pulls herself up, hand over hand like climbing a rope. Then she wheels back to the stove where the water is boiling.

The rest of that first day is spent reconfiguring their kitchen while Artemis does homework in her room. Paula feels much less trapped when she goes through the process of making tea without asking for help. A steaming pot of tea sits on the counter as a visible symbol of her triumph and her head is clear. But she doesn't feel like drinking it all on her own

"Artemis!" She calls.

"Yes?"

"Come to the living room, con gai," she announces. "We will have tea." She has never done this before, but as she speaks, it has the weight of a prophecy. She sees the two of them having tea together at the same time every day. A routine. Something that can become normal. Paula looks up at the clock and decides, yes--four o'clock is a good time for tea. It is summer, so she doesn't have to change this for now.

Artemis relaxes.

\- - -

One of the numbers which Batman gave her is answered with a cheerful, "Gotham Animal Control, how may I help you?"

"What is your address?" she asks.

It's not very far, so she thanks the receptionist and hangs up.

On a free day she and Artemis get on the bus and go fifteen minutes to a big concrete building--with a notice on the door that says, _'Seeking help--temporary full time receptionist position. Inquire within. Opportunities for advancement to a permanent position.'_

Artemis grins.

"We are not getting a dog," Paula warns. Artemis doesn't stop smiling as they approach the desk. "I heard you are looking for a receptionist."

"Oh, yes, we are." The receptionist stands up--very slowly--to dig out an application from her files. Paula wonders if she has a broken leg, but there is no crutch. Then the telltale curve of a _very_ pregnant belly peeks over the desk. "Do you have any experience?"

"No." It stings a bit. Starting all over again, at her age. "But I learn fast."

"You'd better, because you're the only one who's applied so far."

"Why wouldn't anyone want to work with dogs all day?" Artemis asks.

"I do not think I will be petting dogs all day," Paula says.

"You will," the receptionist says. She whistles, and a collar jingles as a chocolate lab stands up, head peeking over the gate. Paula reaches out and gives the dog a good scratch between the ears. Artemis leans over the gate, completely forgetting her teenage dignity. "But sometimes you'll have to clean up after them, too."

\- - -

She has the feeling of being watched.

"What do you want." She looks up to see Batman. By now she has lost any sort of fear. She and Artemis haven't done anything, and even if they did, Batman doesn't kill. She's already been to prison, and while she'd prefer her daughter didn't go, Artemis is too scrappy not to survive. So Paula says, "Hello. Would you like some tea?"

He nods. He doesn't take off his mask as he sits down, not even his gloves.

One thing she and Lawrence used to make fun of is how seriously Batman took himself. "He is a lost cause," she said. "Who fights the underworld alone?" and Lawrence nodded.

"Ain't no telling a fish to fly, sugar."

Now she rather appreciates how serious he is. He sees her wheelchair but says nothing about it. Instead he says, "I'd like some information on Lawrence."

Paula shakes her head. "I don't have any." He nods and turns to move away. "But--" Paula says, and just his head turns back: "I know who might. Ask for Marcus at The Snake Doctor."

"Thank you."  
  
He starts to reach for the pot, but suddenly that seems more humiliating than falling off the counter. Paula stiffens and politely blocks his gloved hand from the handle. "I am sure a man like you is very busy," she tells him. "I will put the dishes away."

"Would you be open to more collaboration?"

She isn't stupid. Her information on the underworld is six years old at best. Now that she's out of the life, it will only get older and dustier. Batman is doing this to boost her morale without looking too sympathetic.

Still, she says, "Feel free to come back."

She turns around to put the dishes away. When she turns back, Batman is gone.

It occurs to her that she doesn't have to rejoin the underworld to know what's going on in it. One daughter is still in the life, after all. And she would like to keep the other daughter safe. People should not close their eyes to a snake in the grass.

A corner of her mouth pricks up.

\- - -

She sometimes feeds the dogs when the kennel workers are late, and scratches the dogs on the head as volunteers give them walks or playtime. At lunch she throws a ball to her favorite puppy, Ace, a rescued pitbull from a fighting ring. The dog reminds her of Artemis. Smart, stubborn, scrappy. Desperate for affection.

Filing reports is easy. Typing up applications for adoption is fine. In that way it's like any other desk job. But emotionally it is harder. Even Paula's heart, callused and heavy, sinks a little further when she sees a new dog come in. Sometimes they are bristling and muzzled, sometimes they quiver in a worker's arms. The worst is when an owner surrenders a dog. If they don't want to abandon their dog, it's always because of money and the dog and the owner are both crying. If they want to abandon their dog, Paula has to watch them sign the papers and turn away as the dog wonders where their person is going.

Ace is an easy one. She was not surrendered or found. She was rescued from a dog-fighting ring. Nobody has to feel bad about separation then. Paula holds Ace in her lap, stroking one hand through the silk-soft puppy fur as she writes a letter to one of her prison friends, Sonia. Ace will be too big soon--she has gone from soft and chubby to long, gangly limbs. She looks like a Great Dane with a pitbull's square head. Even that growth spurt reminds her of Artemis, who is tall for her age.

One day, she asks one of her coworkers: "Do you think I can train Ace to be a service dog?"

"She's pretty big," her coworker says. "Yeah, Ace could be a service dog. There's a place in New York that trains pit bulls--let me find the number. I know for sure they'll keep you with her if you ask."

Paula fills out the paperwork with a special request that they pair Ace with her upon completion of training. She only wishes it wasn't in New York. Before she got the chair, she went as far as Alaska without thinking about anything besides money for gas or a flight--but now she has to think about ramps, surfaces, whether the train has space with her chair, how much a cab will cost, whether the curbs are cut away. What would have been an hour with her legs will easily become two with the chair.

She will manage, though.

She has called a cab to get to the train station, mentions she has a wheelchair and therefore there must be space in the trunk, then goes down the old restored elevator which terrifies Artemis more than it does Paula. The taxi shows up exactly on time, driven by a handsome man with black hair.

"Mrs. Paula Crock?" he asks.

"Yes, that's me."

"Hello, my name's Thomas Maine. But that's my father's name, so call me Tom." He shakes her hand briskly, then takes a notepad out of his pocket and scribbles what she assumes is her name on it. Then he helps her out of the chair and folds it up into the trunk. "Excuse me for writing your fare down by hand--" He taps the little screen on his dashboard, which is unlit. "The machine's not working today." Paula nods noncommittally, half-tuning out. He seems chatty enough that if she nods and smiles he'll keep going on his own. "Where are you headed to? After the train station, of course."

"I'm going to New York," Paula says. "I'm getting my service dog."

"That's a long way to go," he comments. "Why don't I drive you all the way there?"

"Too expensive," Paula answers at once. "I checked."

"Really?" Tom asks mildly. "Even with the discount?"

"What discount?"

"There's a fifty-percent discount for disabled people."

Of course they wouldn't have bothered to say anything about a discount.

"How much would it be?"

"Let's see..." He scribbles equations on his notepad. "Full ride... flat rate, gas, the toll... about $82."

A hundred and sixty-five for the full ride? That's cheaper than she calculated--but not by much. "I don't have the money on me," Paula says. "Anyway, I'll have my dog on the way back so it won't be that bad."

"I insist!" Thomas says. "It's a Wednesday, you're my first call in hours. I'll drive you there and back--just a quick pickup, right?--and I'll take $80 when you get home. How's that?" Before Paula went to jail, she would have gladly accepted this offer. Well, actually she wouldn't even bother with the fare. She would have just stolen the cab.

Now she warns him: "You might get fired for this, you know."

"What, for helping a lady in a wheelchair?" Tom scoffs. "Anyway, they'll have to catch me at it." He rips the paper off the pad and winks at her.

Paula might be on the straight and narrow, but she feels like she's protested enough. She wants her dog. She doesn't want to deal with the train. And the driver offered, after all. "All right. Eighty dollars, then."

He starts talking about his son, Nick, who's taking gymnastics classes and very good at it. Paula talks about Artemis and he says, "She sounds like a very strong-minded young woman."

"If she stopped being so stubborn," Paula says.

"My other son Mason is like that. They'd get along well."

"Aiyuh! Do you think I will let them meet each other?" She shakes her head and Tom laughs. "They would be like two demons!"

They get off at the building in good time. She's surprised that he actually took the quickest way to New York instead of trying to hike up the fare. Thomas gives her his cellphone number to call when she's ready to leave. His handwriting looks familiar. It is neither calligraphy nor chicken-scratch, completely devoid of personality. Surprising for such a charming man.

After the last of the paperwork is filled out, Paula waits in the lobby for Ace to come out. The trainer is an old man with white hair and Ace walks by his side perfectly, not tugging or jumping forward. Her ears prick up at the sight of Paula, but she's still perfectly well behaved until Paula holds her arms out.

"Come here!" The dog skitters over and stops just in front of the chair, then sits, tail wagging and tongue lolling. Paula leans over and touches her forehead to Ace's. "Oh, look, con gai! You are even bigger than you were last time."

"Oh, are you renaming her?"

The endearment slipped out on accident. Paula shakes her head. "It is what I call my daughter."

\- - -

In the morning there's a knock at the door. Artemis, still shy and eager to please, gets it at once. "Mom?" She calls. "Did you order something?"

She did not, but instead of saying so, she wheels over. Normally when there's a package like this, she would tell Artemis not to open it, to throw it very far away and duck for cover. But this time she thanks Artemis and opens it.

It's a pair of new wheelchair gloves with a note in it from Tom Maine saying,  _Well, Paula, you were right. I'm no longer a taxi driver. But don't you worry about me--I work all kinds of jobs._

She had thrown away the list which Batman had given her long ago, but she takes out the note with Thomas Maine's cell phone and thinks that it does look very similar. She tries calling Thomas' number again, but the phone has been disconnected. Artemis offers to break down the box. Paula tells her to make rice instead. She takes it to the recycling herself, all the way down the rickety elevator and into the narrow alley.

She says out loud, "Thank you, Thomas. If that is your name."

"It is not," responds Batman. "But you're welcome."

"Is it really your father's name?"

No response. Paula shrugs and goes back upstairs, smiling.


	2. a legacy within

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I added this chapter because I felt like there needed to be something to bridge the long gap between Batgirl and Oracle. It's loose, but I'm pretty satisfied with it. So now this is a Paula-centric fic.

Ace pricks her ears up in the middle of the day when Artemis is at school. Obviously it is not Batman. Besides being nocturnal, he is the only one that ever escapes Ace's notice. But since whoever it is does not seem to wish them harm, Paula decides to confront the stranger.

"Go to bed, Ace," Paula commands, and the white dog pads off to her kennel and lies down. Wheeling into the living room, she finds a woman in green standing with her hands on her hips. Her hair is waist-length and soot black. If Paula could stand--if she was thirty-odd years younger--she might think she was looking in a mirror.

"Jade."

"Hi, Mom." Jade turns and saunters up to her, arms outstretched for a hug. "Sorry I'm late."

Paula waits until Jade gets within arm's reach. Then she draws back her hand and smacks her daughter across the face.

After a moment's recovery, Jade brushes it off. "I didn't think you'd be _that_ mad. Was it because I missed your release day?" At Paula's glare, she asks, "What? You want me to go straight too?" The side of her face is turning red.

"Give me one reason why I should let you stay in this house."

"I would if I knew why you're so mad at me!"

"Because you left your sister!" Paula snaps.

There is a pause, only a small one, before Jade pulls on an invisible mask of concern. "It was too dangerous for a kid."

If this was the truth, Artemis would have spoken about Jade. She has not once commented on her sister's absence. Also, Jade would have come when Artemis was here, not at school. The silence gapes like a wound.

"You were being selfish." Paula knows that one reason Jade is so proud of her looks is because she does not look like Lawrence. This is why she says, "Just like your father."

"Mom!" Jade howls. "Dad left you!"

"Because I told him to!" Paula shouts. "Both times he left me because I told him to!"

[This was the first time: On the battered radio comes Lawrence, static-ridden, a low whisper like the way he talks in bed: "Better not be you down there, sugar."

"Go," she rasps, fighting the wave of unconsciousness. "The girls, Lawrence."]

"You did not need anyone to tell you to leave your nine year old sister! If that is the sort of person you have become, you are not welcome here either."

This does hurt Jade, Paula can see it as plain as the sun. She knows when Jade loves people and while she has never loved Lawrence entirely, she does loves her mother and sister. The problem is she loves herself more. Her daughter pulls on another mask, the casual smile, and says, "Fine. I've survived this long without you." She disappears. Paula's heart aches.

\- - -

She is not at all surprised when she hears--from a friend of a friend--that Jade has married the Harper boy. It is confirmed by Artemis' angry phone call in the middle of the night.

"Of course the two people I hate most in the world would marry each other!" Artemis rants. "He gave me so much shit in the beginning. Mole this! Mole that! And now I'm his sister-in-law!"

"I thought you were friends now."

"It's the principle, Mom!"

Paula is not surprised when Jade leaves the Harper boy, either, as suddenly as they were married. She figures the reason is equal parts Roy's addiction and the fact that he is obsessed with finding the original Roy, neither of which put Jade at the center of her husband's attention.

She is still disappointed, for many reasons. 

One of them is how she hears it from Artemis, who answers her phone during tea. Her blonde daughter says, with her own blunt sympathy, "Yeah. She did that to me, too. Sorry, man." She hangs up and says, "Jade left Roy. I'm going to buy him a beer or something."

"Maybe not beer," Paula comments.

"Coffee."

\- - -

There comes a knock at the door. Ace pricks up her ears, but looks confused. She grumbles a bit, paces and sniffs at the door while Paula wheels over. It is not Artemis, who Ace happily barks for. Batman never uses the front door. Who could that be at this hour?

It is Jade.

"Mom," she says, sounding years younger.

Paula looks at her dog, who usually knows when Paula is mad at someone and reacts accordingly. She looks at Jade, who so often wears makeup but has none now--her skin is clear and glowing, her lips full, and her hair is even thicker and glossier than usual.

"You're pregnant," Paula remarks.

"I don't know what to do."

Of course not, Paula thinks as she wonders whether or not to let Jade in. Because Jade has never given a moment's thought to anyone besides herself in twenty-three years. Now here is another person inside her, and she cannot escape thinking about _that_. Jade does not think of the future either, and children are a legacy. But Jade can love people, Paula reminds herself--even if she does not show it often or well. At the very least, this child will be loved.

"We need some tea," Paula says. She turns around, leaving Ace to watch her daughter as she bustles into the kitchen.

She comes back out with the tea to find Jade crying on the couch and the dog beside her, licking her face.

"What are you crying for!" she admonishes Jade. "You're only pregnant."

"The only doctors I know deal with bullets and poisons and stitches!"

"Don't worry about that," Paula tells her. "I know someone."

"If you think I'm going to a _hospital--_ "

"No, that would take too long. You'll be arrested or targeted."

Jade frowns. "I thought you went straight."

"I have. But you haven't."

\- - -

That night she leaves Ace at home with Jade and goes to the police station on her own. "May I speak with Commissioner Gordon, please?"

He shows up and greets her. "Paula! Good evening!" He automatically reaches a hand out to pet Ace before realizing the dog isn't there. "Has Ace gone missing?"

"No, she is at home."

"What can I help you with, then?"

"I would like to go up to the roof to discuss a family matter."

His face goes stern and serious. "Paula, you know you don't need _him_ to get rid of Lawrence."

"Thank you, but it is not Lawrence this time. If you must know, you can stay during our conversation. It should not take long."

He accompanies her to the roof and turns on the signal.

"Mrs. Crock," comes a voice.

"My daughter is pregnant," she says.

A pause. "Congratulations."

"That's... wonderful," Gordon says, with a raised eyebrow. "But begging your pardon, Paula--I still don't see why you needed all... _this._ "

Paula sighs. "My _other_ daughter." She turns back to find Batman has written something on a piece of paper that he holds out to her--a phone number belonging to a _Dr. Leslie Thompkins_. "Thank you." She wheels herself back to the elevator.

"Doesn't mince words, does she?" Gordon asks. "I should have known you two were friends."

\- - -

"You called _Batman?!_ " Jade shouts. She sounds too insulted to pity herself anymore, and that is a good thing. "Mom! I don't want the _Dark Knight_ to know I've been knocked up!"

"He is useful for complicated situations like this. Anyway, I am certain he knew before I told him."

"What if he takes the kid away because I'm an assassin?" This is promising. Jade is already attached to the baby in concept.

"He did not take you or Artemis away," Paula points out.

Jade sulks. "So we owe him one. How would I even pay him back? Any money I get is illegal."

"He does not ask for payment when children are involved."

"So--" Jade struggles to understand this. "He's just going to help us with this and not expect anything in return?"

"Yes," Paula tells her. "That is what people do when they are not selfish." This is as much a warning as it is a statement. Parents should not be selfish. Batman, she recalls, has two sons.

"He won't even show up and ask me to go straight?"

"He didn't say anything to me or your father."

"Well..." Jade sighs. "I guess he doesn't have time to meddle with everyone's personal lives. But I still don't have to like this."

"You won't like anything about being pregnant," Paula says.

"Oh, please." Jade tosses her head. "How hard can it be?"

\- - -

She isn't surprised when she's mopping her daughter's forehead in Leslie Thompkins' clinic and Jade mumbles, "You're right. I'm stopping at one."

She is surprised that Jade names the girl Lian. And that Jade listens to her and stops drinking coffee, strong teas, and alcohol while she breastfeeds. Artemis comes home from Stanford for tea one day to find her sister on the couch, Lian and Ace playing on the floor. She shrugs and says, "Hey Jade. Did you steal that kid or make her yourself?"

And with that there is a truce struck between them--Artemis does not speak much, but she does answer civilly. She plays with the baby and tries to cajole Lian into calling her "dì." Paula's heart beats with hope for the first time in a long time when Lian pulls Artemis' hank of blond hair and laughs. It blends in with Jade's laugh perfectly.

About a month later, she comes to the living room to see Jade throwing her things into a suitcase with the same carelessness she gives everything, besides taking care of Lian--who is on a sling on her back. Paula is taken back to more than twenty years ago when she and Lawrence carried their daughters with them.

"We're out of your hair, Mom," Jade announces. "I'm going to Star City for a while."

"Just like that? You won't let me say goodbye to my granddaughter?"

"She's right here," Jade tells her.

She turns her back and crouches. Paula sighs and takes Lian out of the sling, combing her granddaughter's hair. It's a strange color, a mix of red and brown. Not quite as thick as Jade's, not quite as bright as Roy Harper. "Why are you going to Star City, anyway?"

"I thought maybe I should tell my husband about our daughter," Jade says. And now Paula really is surprised because Jade hasn't mentioned Roy Harper at all. "Okay, Lian! Say bye to bà ngoại and Ace!"

Paula frowns, but hugs Lian close and holds her out to Ace for a dog's farewell. Lian is a happy baby, but when she's put back in the sling, she cries. It's a thin, small cry--it reminds her of her daughters but she can't remember which one, or for what reason.

"Don't forget, con gai--" Paula says on the sidewalk, fighting tears. "No breastfeeding until five hours after you've drunk alcohol or caffeine!"

"You're being dramatic, Mom," Jade says, waving as she heads to the bus stop. "We'll be back soon."

A taxi rolls up and the passenger's window goes down. The driver has black hair and a brilliant smile. Ace's tail starts wagging. Paula smirks.

"Where are you headed?"

"Star City, handsome," Jade answers, with more than a little bit of flirtatiousness. Then she says, "We're going back to Daddy, aren't we, con gai?"

"Don't tell me you're _walking_ there!" the driver exclaims.

"I could, but I'm not wearing the right shoes, so I'm going to the airport instead."

"I'll give you a lift."

"Sure, thanks--" Jade starts to nod, then stops and looks puzzled for a moment. "Wait. Why was I taking the bus, though?"

"Whatever cash you can spare is fine with me."

"It's not that." Jade looks at Paula. "Why didn't you want me to take a taxi again, Mom?"

"Aiyuh...!" Paula wheels back to the curb. "Because you need a baby seat and they charge through the nose." Although this driver won't. She was wondering when he would show up.

"Oh, don't worry about that, ma'am." There's a flash of that charming grin before the driver gets out and opens the trunk. "I don't charge for passengers under four years old." He tips his hat before hauling out a baby chair--and a very good one, too. "If I didn't know better, I'd ask if that lovely lady over there was your sister."

Jade snorts. "Laying it on a little thick, cabbie."

"My daughter needs to get there _on time,_ Thomas!"

"Nice to see you again, Paula--and Ace," the driver says. Ace barks in response.

Jade doesn't lift a finger except to hand him Lian, who chatters happily as she's buckled into the back seat.

"And hello, Lian," he says. Jade doesn't notice that he knows Lian's name already. "What a beautiful little girl. Me, I've got three boys--Nick, Mason, and Jim."


	3. oracle

Years later, after Artemis has changed her working name to Tigress and Lian has grown enough to crawl after Ace, Paula is watching one of her shows when the Gotham Notice interrupts.

Barbara Gordon has gone missing. She went to school with Artemis. More famously, she is the daughter of James Gordon. They never met, but Paula feels something in her deflate. Even the Commissioner's daughter will not escape the underground of Gotham.

Footage of Batman on the search for Gordon's daughter surfaces. Batman is the same. He's with Batgirl, which would be normal if Paula didn't take a closer look. She raises an eyebrow when she does: Batgirl's hair is as red and lush as ever but she looks leaner, with a sharpness to her moves that speaks of lethal training (of _Lawrence's_ training), not Batman's controlled style at all.

She expects Artemis to come home for a visit. She makes some tea and puts it on the warmer.

The door opens at four-thirty and Artemis comes in. "Hi, Mom."

"Con gai! What are you doing back home?"

"I heard..." Artemis looks back at the door. "I heard Babs was missing. My high school friend. I came back because I thought I might be able to do something."

\- - -

Barbara Gordon is found, but only after the Joker shot her in the spine and fled the scene.

The whole city is shaken. Even the underworld reverberates with shock. They might kidnap children for ransom. They might turn a blind eye to collateral damage. But Paula and Lawrence wouldn't have had children if they weren't reasonably certain that killing them would be off-limits. At the very least, to colleagues without grudges.

If the Joker was a sensible man, Paula might think Commissioner Gordon's daughter was a warning. But this is years after he killed Jason Todd, one of Bruce Wayne's sons, fifteen and getting his act together, for no reason the public could see. There was no ransom, there was no overarching scheme that Jason Todd happened to get caught up in. The Joker simply woke up one day, kidnapped a child, and beat him to death before Batman made it there.

During that awful time when they could not escape the news of the warehouse explosion, Paula had thought of the taxi driver and his three sons. Of how Bruce Wayne also had black hair and three sons, of how many rhymes there are between their names. She had scavenged dark, grainy news and cellphone footage on the Internet. Normal people would have only seen one difference, that Robin was using a staff. Paula saw that this boy was slimmer, shorter--maybe a few years younger. His fighting style was less wild.

Artemis comes home that night crying. "They found her. They found her but--"

Paula is taken back to the night when she herself woke up on the concrete.

_I am sorry. I had not wanted this to happen._

"She is alive, isn't she?" Paula asks. "There is that."

\- - -

Paula keeps an eye on the news and waits until after she hears that Barbara has been released from the hospital. Then she leaves Ace with Artemis and wheels out of the house at about four. She is not in the least bit surprised when a taxi shows up.

"Are you going where I think you're going, Paula?" The driver's voice sounds deeper than usual.

"Of course I am."

He nods and drives her over to the Gordon's house in a grave silence.

There's a ramp installed already. She wheels up to the door and rings the bell.

Gordon answers, looking at his own eye-level for a moment before glancing down. "Oh, Paula," he says. "Good afternoon--how are you?"

"I am well, thank you," Paula says.

"And what brings you here?"

Sometimes being polite is being silly. Paula raises an eyebrow.

He sighs. "Well, come on in."

Barbara is in the living room, wearing pajamas and staring aimlessly at a book with swollen, red eyes.

"Babs? This is a friend of mine, Paula Crock," Gordon says. "She thought she'd talk to you about what happened."

It looks like Barbara has cut her hair herself--a jagged bob. She barely turns her head to look at Paula. While she notices the chair, she looks away with a flare of youthful stubbornness and introduces herself with a polite distance. Paula can tell that the girl is determined to not think about what has happened.

"Get dressed," Paula orders her.

"Where are we going?"

"Nowhere," Paula says. "But you look like you just got out of bed. So brush your hair."

Her eyes flash with temper. Mrs. Gordon steps in. "I'll get your things, honey--"

"Why?" Paula says. "She is a grown woman." She turns to face Barbara. "Get them yourself." Barbara grits her teeth. She's facing away from the hall. Her father reaches for the handles of the wheelchair, but Paula wheels over to block his arm. "Aiyuh!" Paula clucks. "Your arms are working, aren't they! I have told you something simple--go to your room and change, young lady! Hasn't your mother told you that?"

"I don't even _know_ you!" Barbara yells. "Why are you ordering me around?"

"Because you have gotten enough sympathy from everyone else!" Paula snaps. "It will not help you now!"

There is dead silence. Instead of storming off in a huff, Barbara looks ashamed of herself. She averts her gaze and gets compliant as she starts to wheel around to the hallway. Aiyuh, that wasn't what Paula wanted at all. She forgot this isn't Artemis she's dealing with, Artemis who doesn't listen until something's been pounded into her head a few times.

"Beg pardon, Mrs. Crock, but could you..." Gordon clears his throat. "Be a little less blunt?"

Paula adjusts her tactics. She speaks clearly enough for Barbara to hear all the way from her room, even if she closes the door. "She got shot in the spine and survived. So why are you worried about what I say to her?" Paula pivots her chair. "Where is the kitchen? I will make some tea."

Mrs. Gordon accompanies her, and to Paula's pleasant surprise, there is a wide range of many good teas which she did not expect from a middle-class white family.

"They're all Barbara's," Mrs. Gordon says. "I can't make heads or tails of them. She spends so much time reading and drinking tea that everyone who knows her gets her a box. For Christmas, her birthday, New Year's and, well, whenever we think of her. Normally she drinks it all before the month's over, but..."

Paula nods. "That is good to know." Only a few of the boxes have been opened. It seems that either Barbara has not done much reading lately--or, Paula notes, seeing that the boxes are all crammed onto the top shelves, she simply could not reach them. Spying a box of ginseng, Paula exclaims, "There! Could you get that for me? The ginseng."

"Yes, of course--" Mrs. Gordon looks at Paula's chair, and then at the cabinets, too far out of reach, and covers her mouth with a hand. "Oh, God. _That's_ why she hasn't been drinking tea! She normally makes them herself because she has so many--I thought she just didn't have the energy, but--they're out of reach, of _course._ "

"She does not have much energy, either," Paula points out. "Or does she stay in her pajamas all day?"

"I'll move them while you're having tea," Mrs. Gordon decides.

"No," Paula says. "She can do that herself. She knows how they are organized."

\- - -

"I'm studying to be a librarian," Barbara says over their cups.

"That is very good!" Paula says. "You do not even have to change it now that you are in a chair."

Barbara spits out her tea. Then she laughs. Even though Paula has never heard her laugh before, she can tell that it's a little too loud--a little too fast. But at the very least, she sounds like a young woman again. And now Paula sees how best to manage her.

"Aiyuh!" Paula says. She wheels over to the paper towels and grabs some in a fist before wiping the table and grumbling, "I spend ten minutes making that tea and you spit it all over the table. Was it that bad?"

"If it's supposed to be bitter," Barbara retorts, "It was perfect."

"It is ginseng! Of course it is supposed to be bitter!" Paula tells her. "That is how you know tea is good. You Americans with your sugar and milk."

When tea is over, Paula takes the cups and teapot to the kitchen, then looks at the cabinets. "I will be coming back here next week, so we should make this easier." She wheels her chair until one side is just along the kitchen island, then hauls herself up onto the counter. At first she puts the boxes down one by one--then she gets an idea and sweeps them all down into her lap.

Ignoring Barbara's indignant gasp, Paula announces, "This cabinet is a mess. I will sort them for you."

"Um, they're already organized," Barbara says. "Well-- _were._ " The girl winces as Paula roughly tosses all of the jasmine teas into a pile.

"Then I will sort them again. In alphabetical order, since you are a librarian."

"No, not _alphabetical_ \--!" Barbara wheels closer and tries to snatch at some of the boxes. "If I grab pu'erh instead of peppermint I won't sleep for three days!"

"Then you sort them." Paula grips the edge of the counter and settles back into her chair. Barbara is very strong for a librarian. Even her youth does not explain how she pulls herself up so very easily. Without eight years of living in a wheelchair, it is quite suspicious. But Paula will say nothing about simple suspicions.

Barbara starts muttering to herself as she sorts four piles--herbal, white, green, black. She puts most of them back in the cabinet, but a few boxes--most likely her favorites--remain on the counter in easy reach. Then she grips the edge of the counter and Paula knows what is about to happen. She wheels closer and blocks Barbara from trying to jump down.

"Your chair, Barbara."

Barbara looks at the chair with hate in her eyes.

It is just a little too far out of reach, and positioned entirely wrong for a paralyzed woman to climb back in on her own. The girl leans, stretches out her arms as far as they can go--but she can't get a good grip on it and that is when the tears come. She tries one more time to swipe at a handle before she nearly falls, and then she hurriedly sits back up straight, fussing with her hair, pretending not to be afraid. Paula recognizes that pride. Barbara will be humiliated if she has to call her parents--to carry her down like a child.

A surge of sympathy goes through Paula. "You can get down by yourself," she says gently.

"But how can I--" Barbara does not believe her for a second, shaking her head. "How--" Then she looks at Paula, back in her own chair. "Right--you got back. B-but I don't remember how..." She takes her glasses off and wipes her eyes, then takes a deep breath. "Could you please show me how you did it?"

Paula pivots Barbara's empty chair to the side and pushes it against the counter. One arm against the edge, the other within reach. She holds the chair steady, and Barbara climbs down with the care of someone carrying a tray full of glasses on a rickety bridge. But she makes it back into her chair in one piece. No falling. No help from anyone besides Paula, which is all right since she is also in a chair.

"Thank you, Mrs. Crock."

"Call me Paula."

\- - -

The next week at the same time, she visits with Ace. Barbara answers the door herself. She wears a pressed summer dress and her haircut has been improved to a stylish angled bob. She greets Ace with a scratch on the head.

There is a teapot on the living room table already, filled with masala chai--but double strength, so the first sip stings Paula's mouth. Barbara looks her in the eye and empties the entire cream pitcher into her drink, along with several spoonfuls of sugar.

"James!" Paula shouts. "Your daughter stole all the milk. Bring some more for us."

"Too bitter?" Barbara asks sweetly. "I thought that was how you knew tea was good."

"This is Indian tea--it needs milk and sugar."

Afterward, Ace softly prods Paula's knee with her nose and Paula decides to take her dog outside for exercise. Barbara comes along and they talk about small things before the roots of an old tree on the sidewalk and some hedges around a yard force them to squeeze across the sidewalk single file.

"How did..." Barbara pauses. "How did you get paralyzed?"

"I fell out of a window."

The redhead sighs. "I'm sorry."

"Do not feel sorry for me, Barbara. I was trying to kill someone when I broke my back. That fall saved someone else's life."

Barbara is not Artemis. She is tactful. "Still, I wouldn't wish this on anyone."

"Even after I fell, I did not regret it," Paula warns her. "I regretted getting caught. If anyone deserved to have their back broken, it was me back then."

"What made you change your mind?" Barbara asks. "About being a criminal?"

"A therapist." Paula tries to recall. "A blonde woman. I feel like her name was... Harriet? Or Hallie. But her last name was Quinzel, I know. She was transferred to Arkham later."

"What did she say?"

She had been fond of Dr. Quinzel because her blonde hair and youth reminded her of Artemis. "She said, 'Who says you have to stop killing people just because you're in a chair? You don't have to stand to poison someone.' It was a joke. She was that kind of therapist."

Barbara doesn't laugh.

"I realized then that it would be easy to keep on killing people. I would just have to change my methods a little. Actually, it would be harder to go straight. I didn't know anyone outside of the underworld. Gotham was very bad back then."

"What made you change your mind?"

"Spending more time in prison, away from my family--or longer." Barbara is silent. "Yes, it was selfish." Paula shrugs. "But that is the point of prison, yes? To make you regret what you did. I missed my children growing up. I did not want my grandchildren to be born without me. So I decided to stay out of the life for good."

"You're married, right?"

"Separated." It stings still. "I left. He stayed in."

"You _are_ that Paula Crock!"

"I have never kept it a secret."

Barbara looks embarrassed. "You're Artemis' mom."

"Yes."

"It's weird how we've never met before."

Paula waves a hand.

\- - -

The day before Paula goes to tea at the Gordon's house, Barbara calls to say she is sorting out her return to school, but she will be back in time for tea or dinner.

Paula decides to take Barbara to a restaurant she has grown to like--one with a bar and dartboard.

Barbara fiddles with the darts for a while as they wait for their food to come, throwing a few. Her form is very good, but she still misses most of her shots by a few inches and finally gives up with a sigh. "I don't know why I'm missing so much. I used to be--" She looks around at the passers by, who don't seem to be paying attention. But she changes what she was about to say anyway. "I used to be great at this game."

"I was, too," Paula says, smiling.

"Do you still practice?"

"Practice!" Paula exclaims. "I am sixty-one years old! I would not practice anything even if I had my legs."

"But you have experience," Barbara points out. She hands Paula a handful of darts and wheels out of the way.

Paula throws them loosely, not caring about accuracy for a few minutes. Her arm must remember how it worked before she became chair-bound. She was not a ranged fighter but she knows accuracy is about muscle memory, about consistency. It is Artemis' stubbornness, which she got from Lawrence. Not Paula or Jade's subtlety.

Then her assassin mind comes back.

She thinks about how if she had to kill someone who she couldn't get close to, if a gun would be too loud or hard to sneak in, a poison dart would be the thing she would use. Why a thrown dart? Shot darts can go farther. But the gun would be hard to smuggle in. Yes--a dart which looked like the ones at a bar could be snuck in anywhere. A scratch on the hand would be enough. Or she could hit him in the neck from out of sight and pull the dart away. Touch and go. Her realm, not Lawrence's with his hammer and javelins, smashing in walls. She goes in through the front door and someone ends up dead.

The target becomes the neck of a person and Paula lets her forearm rest along the arm of her chair, holding the dart away from herself. She must not scratch herself or hit anyone else. How far is she? Why hasn't she been striking true? She scans the tiles and realizes she is too far away. She's used to lunging forward a little. Now she can't lunge. She could wind up harder--but no, that is too big a movement, she will be seen. Her left hand grips a wheel at about her hip and pushes to her knee without letting it coast further.

A foot closer. She scans. That is better, she decides.

She holds her breath. Pinches the dart firmly without clutching it. Lifts the dart to her cheek (do not scratch yourself). Subtlety.

Her wrist flicks.

The dart lands in the center of the board.

Paula pivots her wheelchair, ready to disappear into the crowd--but people applaud instead of screaming and with a jolt she remembers where she is, who she is with, what she is doing, and most importantly that she has not killed anyone in years.

Barbara is smart, but no mind-reader. She smiles with everyone else and asks pointedly, "You don't practice, hmm?"

"That does not mean I forgot everything." Paula sniffs.

Barbara continues the conversation as they return to their table. "When you threw the last dart--your face changed. Like you remembered something."

"I remembered..." Paula frowns. "That it is in the wrist." A server comes with their food and she takes the opportunity to start eating, to shake herself out of the assassin mind. These are not training sessions--Barbara is not her daughter or student. She is only getting Barbara used to the chair so that her confidence will come back. And she only needed a little bit of help for that.

"You were thinking a long time just for that."

"I am old," Paula says. "I have a lot of memories."

"But you looked so serious." Ah, and this is another thing different from Artemis. Artemis knows when Paula will not answer a question and she would have given up by now.

Paula looks up and says sharply, "Some things are not meant to be said out loud. Remember that I was not like you. I have no desire to go back to what I was before the chair."

"I--" Barbara flounders a little. "I don't want to go back. Not exactly."

"You at least want to walk again."

This strikes Barbara with tears instantly. She looks down into her food, eyes brimming, for a long time. "Does it stop?" she whispers. "Will I stop wanting to walk again in eight years?"

Paula thinks about running on rooftops with her husband, walking her daughters to school, being able to look people straight in the eye or pick things up off the floor without Ace's help. She loves Ace. She still has her daughters if not her husband. But she decides to be honest. "No."

Barbara drinks her soda like it's a beer. She doesn't seem satisfied.

"It gets easier, though." Paula shoves her glass across the table. "Here."

"But--uh--that's alcohol, isn't it?"

"You are in college," Paula tells her. "Don't pretend to be innocent." Barbara laughs, still with tears in her eyes, and takes a sip of the drink before making a face and pushing it back.

As they leave the bar, a taxi pulls up. "Need a ride, ladies? I can fit both chairs in."

"Yes, Thomas."

"No, thank you," Barbara says. "I don't live far."

"Stay safe, then," Paula tells her. Barbara nods and gives Paula a brief hug, then pivots her chair and wheels down the sidewalk without a second glance at the driver. She doesn't seem to recognize him.

"What a nice night it is," said driver comments, looking up as he collapses Paula's chair. Then his gaze drifts over to the rooftop of a nearby building. Paula catches a glimpse of a wiry young woman with long hair and a cape--a silhouette that vanishes as soon as Paula notices it.

Artemis is not home when Thomas drops her off, so Paula waits in the dark living room until she hears the door open very quietly at around twelve.

Paula claps to turn on the lights, getting a shout of surprise from Artemis. "These late nights should not keep happening once you get back to Stanford. You need your rest to get good grades."

"I'll only be here a few more days," Artemis says. "I checked up on Babs and she's doing great. Getting shot in the spine takes a lot out of people--but she's tough." Artemis takes off her shoes and scratches Ace beween the ears. Then she looks up at Paula and says, almost timid, "Like you. I mean, I guess you'd know how she feels."

"How would I know what Barbara feels?" Paula asks. "I never got shot. I fell out of a window."

Artemis snorts. "Right, Mom. That makes everything completely different."


End file.
